Speaker: Mike NobisSunday School Teacher, Former Elder at Madison Park Christian Church. Mike is President of JK Creative Printers & Mailing in Quincy, IL. He is married to Pam and has three children, Tom, Tyler and Jennifer. Mike has three grandchildren: Ryne, Ivy and Alicia.

What is your personal view of God? First of all, is there a God? Second, does this God have any significance in your world? Third: Does God alter your world and the environment around you?

A low view of God is the cause of a hundred lesser evils. A high view of God is the solution to tens of thousands temporal problems. A. W Tozer

Japan this week has been all over the news. First there was the earthquake that spawned a large tsunami. The devastation of that event quickly spread massive problems for that country. The one everyone is watching closely is the nuclear disaster taking place. Not just one reactor is in danger of melting down, they have four in major trouble. To give you a sense of what they face we only have to go back to August 6, 1945 when the first nuclear weapon was unleashed on Hiroshima by the United States.

It took 43 seconds for the bomb to fall from the Enola gay. 1,900 feet above ground the bomb was detonated which triggered the first subatomic chain reaction. In the matter of a millionth of a second, that chain reaction went through 80 generations of doubling. The bomb reached temperatures of several million degrees, the temperature equal to the core of the Sun. When the bomb exploded 4 square miles were immediately evaporated and massive devastation was caused for over 12 miles. The blast produced so much energy that the glare blast would have been visible from Jupiter over 390 million miles away.

The energy produced by that bomb was the by-product of a subatomic reaction that used only 1% of 2 pounds of uranium. One-third of one ounce of uranium is virtually inconceivable. In Japan, one rod in those nuclear reactors has more power that our minds can fathom. They have a massive problem brewing. For me, all this leads to one very important question, how can you and I even begin to comprehend the potential energy of the omnipotent Creator who created all matter?

The truth is, we can’t. Paul points out to us this very fact when he prayed:

Ephesians 1:18-21 I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come.

What Paul prayed for was for the church to awaken to a reality that just staggers the mind when we actually think about it. None of us can imagine what God is capable of. But can you begin to imagine what we are capable of when we give complete control over to God who lives within us? His power sets off a chain reaction and with his energy at work within us, what is there out there that we can not do? That is a very powerful question to contemplate. It is also a very dangerous question to consider as well.

So what is out there beyond our church walls that is powerful enough to stop God within us from accomplishing anything and everything for Him? What is the reality in your life? What is the reality in this church? Why?

God loves it when we break a sweat for a kingdom cause. BUT, exerting our own strength is not enough. Loving God with all our strength is living in His strength. But many of us never flip on the switch. We never receive the power he promised. And without His power, we become nothing more than theological Christians. Our testimony is reduced to our words. Our impact is reduced to our abilities. And not only is that less than exciting, its wrong. Without his power at work within us, we can not accomplish his purposes.

What is needed in the church today? What is needed I MPCC today? We need to rediscover the primal energy that sustained the first-century church during persecution. It is about discovering the primal energy that propelled them to take the gospel to the four corners of the ancient world. It is about rediscovering the primal energy that empowered them to do miracles in Jesus’ name.

According to what we actually do, how big is Our God? Does MPCC have a low view of God or a high view of God and how is our view played out on our very day ministries?

For example: On a very bad day, do we tend to reduce God to the size of our greatest failure, our biggest problem, or our worst fear? Or on a good day, do we tend to reduce God to the size of our greatest gift, highest hope or our best attribute? This actually goes against one of the first realities of God. It goes against a very important principle…we are made in God’s image; God is not made in our image. But that is what happens to many Christians, we create God in our image and we worship a God that we imagine, not the God of reality and actuality.

So what does a small view of God have to do with loving God with all your strength? What does loving God with all your strength really mean? Most Christians get this all wrong? In fact, we actually get it backwards. Loving God with all our strength is not about what we can do for God, it is all about what God can do in you and through you.

Is there anything more thrilling than doing something you didn’t think could be done? Give me an example. As a parent, is there anything more thrilling than to see your child accomplish something that was thought to be impossible? What about God? How does your accomplishment make God feel when through Him we accomplish what was thought to be impossible?

Paul prayed for an awakening unlike anything the church has ever experienced. Unfortunately many churches have never experienced it because they never can imagine it. The word for “strength” in his prayer is the same word used by Jesus in the Greatest Command. What Jesus and Paul referred to was a supernatural strength beyond natural ability.

Have you ever been put in a situation that the best you can do is no longer the best you can do? What would life be like in that kind of reality?

The moment you and I enter into a relationship with Jesus, the best we can do is the best that God can do. When we enter into the covenant of Christ, we enter into a kingdom of infinite possibilities. No longer is it about our strength, it is all about his. And living a life that goes beyond the limits of human capacity is more than just exciting, it is the actual way we love God with all our strength.

E=MC2

What is this equation? What is it all about and who discovered it?

Albert Einstein discovered the equation for energy or relativity. Basically energy equals mass multiplied by the speed of light, squared. What is fascinating is this equation is also the equation for loving God with all your strength. It should not surprise us that this equation is totally Biblical. If God created everything, then this too was created by God and the principles of energy rests upon the reality of God.

Energy =Mass x Light2

Think of mass being sweat equity. It is the energy that we invest in kingdom causes and without our expenditure of energy, nothing happens. But the essential key to this equation is light. We all know this, without an energy source, mass is dead. A lamp is useless unless it is plugged into an energy source. In the theory of evolution, mass by itself, self created out of nothing. Even if that happened, without an energy source, mass is dead. Look what the Bible says about that.

Genesis 1:1-3 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.

The real key to this equation is light. Without light energy doesn’t happen. Without an energy source, mass is only mass and does nothing. Add light and everything kicks into existence.

1 John 1:5 This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light.

Think of light2 as His power at work within us. It is His power that completes the equation. He empowers us and energizes us.

Supernatural Synergy = Sweat Equity x His power2

Doing vs. Receiving

This brings us to something we should have dealt with right from the start of this lesson series because this is the crux of the matter. When Jesus spoke these words how it was received was probably incorrect. Knowing the Jews especially the Pharisees, their concept on this would have been backwards. In fact, many Christians, maybe even you receive this incorrectly.

Mark 12:29-30 “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’

In and of ourselves, we are not capable of loving God. We can not manufacture love for Him. That is exactly how the Jews saw love, they tried to manufacture a love from their perspective of love and then somehow give it to Him. Many Christians are the same way. But what happens in the life of someone who has to manufacture love? Example, prearranged marriages. Is the love in a prearranged marriage the same kind of love God is talking about?

We can only respond to His love for us. Religion is all about doing things for God. Christianity is all about receiving what Christ did for us on the Cross. What ever we do for God is a reflection of and response to what God has done for us. Too many Christians practice their religion so God hears their voice. A person who loves God lives their life listening to God voice.

True or False: Christianity is not about what we can do for God, it is about what God has already done for us.

If this is true, then how does that change how we love God with all our strength?

True or False: Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for Him?

If this is true, then what does this mean? How does this get played out in our lives?

Romans 12:1 Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual£ act of worship.

Here is the best way I can explain it. I go back again to astronomy. Does anyone know what an “albedo” is? Albedo is the measurement of how much light a celestial body reflects. Our moon’s albedo measurement is .07. In other words, 7%of the light that strikes the moon’s surface is reflected back to earth. Enceladus, one of the moons around Saturn has the highest albedo rating in our solar system. It reflects 99% of the light that hits its surface because the moon is almost totally covered in ice.

In a similar way we are like a moon of Jesus. We reflect his light. We are the reflection of who Jesus is, his compassion, his wonder, his creativity and his energy. We can manufacture these things, we only reflect them. Our love for God is nothing more and nothing less than a reflection of God’s love for us.

Let’s go back to the first words spoken by God, Let there be light”. God speaks, and the first sound waves don’t just travel through space, they create. As we see in those first three verses light waves beginning to defeat darkness at a rate of 186,000 miles a second based on today’s calculations for the speed of light (light is slowing down). When we hear the word SAID we think in terms of linguistics. But talking is more than that, from a physics perspective, sound isn’t language, it is a form of energy. Today, almost all that we hear and how we communicate depends upon the energy of sound.

The energy of sound is so vast. Humans can talk and hear only in very narrow bands widths of sound. But there are levels of sound that goes way beyond our ability to hear them or see them. A person might say I have never heard the voice of God. But that is very untrue because you might not have heard his voice between the 55 and 800 hertz spectrum of sound, but we have seen his voice. Everything we see today came from his voice.

It is amazing, everything in the universe was created from 4 words, “Let there be light”. Today they say the universe is still expanding, being created from the original command spoken at the beginning of time.

So let me ask you this one question, If God can create billions of galaxies with just four words, what can’t God do? And if the promises of God are true and that he actually lives in us and works through us, then what can’t we do?

So isn’t it time to stop serving our purposes and start serving his? Isn’t it time we stop striving in our own strength and start flowing in his? Isn’t it time to stop building your own kingdom and start advancing his? And when we learn to love God with all our hearts, soul, mind and strength, then life will exceed our wildest imaginations. Why? Because His love will be reflected in our lives.